A Kommando's Life
by Chris Kangaroo
Summary: Human, Eldar, Ork... all societies have to have their pariahs. Snikmug is a Kommandos Nob trying to find his place in the galaxy as the only Ork with ethical values. A primarily Orky story with plenty of silliness.
1. Introduction

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Introduction**_

In all my years of service as an Inquisitor of the Ordo Xenos, I have come into contact with many alien species countless times. Often my task is to eradicate them, but sometimes I have the opportunity to observe and study them instead. I relish such opportunities, for the behaviour and culture of aliens has always been a fascinating subject for me. As an Amalathian, I oppose the division of the Inquisition into sub-factions – anything and everything that would threaten human life is my foe, whether daemon, heretic or alien. But since I must, I have chosen to align myself with the Ordo Xenos, if only to further my interests.

In my previous work, _The Greater Good: Social psychology of the Tau_, I outlined the mechanisms of social control and group dynamics present amongst this intriguing new race. What I have come to realise, however, is that similar phenomena occur across all the sentient races throughout the galaxy, not just the Tau but also Eldar, Human and even Ork. Though each culture has its own, unique definition of normality, there will always, unfailingly, be deviations from the norm to varying degrees.

We are taught by our educators that all Orks attack from the front in a great horde, and yet some Orks insist on sneaking through the shade. We are taught that all Eldar are deviant psykers, and yet I have seen many who are incapable of casting even the slightest cantrip. We are taught that all Tau are slaves to the Greater Good, and yet there are still those who question the authority of the Ethereal caste, no matter how viciously they are repressed.

Strange how the universe works… no matter how much we are encouraged to conform, outsiders from the group continue to exist. Our thoughts and behaviour are under constant pressure from both within and without – our genes command us to obey our instincts, our environments demands us to adapt or die, our society instructs us to follow the crowd and ask no questions. And in spite of all this, fate persists in throwing up anomalies every once in a while.

Human, Tau, Eldar or Ork, all social creatures inevitably find within their midst those who are different, despite outward similarities. Those who reject the norms of their society, perhaps in favour of another one. Who is to say? Perhaps in a different context their behaviour may be seen as completely normal and acceptable.

The greatest irony is that those who dare to be different are not always the ones who really want to.


	2. Chapter 1

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 1**_

Snikmug poked his head out of the bush and took a quick look around, checking for signs of danger in the vicinity. He ducked back down again, just in time as the beams of humie torches swept across the area where, had they arrived only moments before, they would have spotted the unmistakable red glint of Orkish eyes. The Imperial Guard patrol trudged on, entirely unaware of the presence of greenskins in the bushes around their base camp.

Snikmug watched the humies as they gradually faded into the evening gloom. Only once he had judged that they were out of hearing distance did he turn to address his Kommandos mob.

"Roight den, ladz, we stickz ta da plan," he said in hushed tones, or what passed for hushed tones by Orky standards at least. "We waitz 'ere till Boom gives us da signal, den Weedy blows da boomfings, we go in an' fro' stikkbommz inta everyfing an' runz away before da humiez know wotz goin' on. Oi! You'z two stop dat or I'll thump ya gud!"

Rok and Garok reluctantly stopped poking each other in the eye for the sake of starting an argument.

"Boom'll be ready any time now," Snikmug continued. "I wantz everyone ta… Hey, where'z Norg?"

Even as he said that, Snikmug felt his gut clench in dread. He stuck his head out of the bush again and sure enough, there was his dim-witted subordinate, charging towards the humie camp and bellowing his signature war cry, from which he had derived his name.

"Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooorrrrgggg!!"

I knew it, thought Snikmug. Somebody just had to get impatient, forget that they were supposed to be waiting and go dashing off on his own. And once that happened everything else went to hell…

"Norg, get back 'ere!" shouted Grobkosh. Snikmug promptly bashed him on the head for the act of unbelievable stupidity. What had he told them about not yelling when they were trying not to be spotted?

"Quiet, ya git, yer gunna give us away…" he started, but before he could say anything else, the sound of lasfire rang out like thunderclaps. The Kommandos immediately broke cover and scattered on reflex, running off in all directions to find things more substantial than a bush to hide behind. Snikmug jumped, ducked and rolled out of the way of flurries of lasbolts aimed at him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Rok go down, his chest punctured by laser fire, then his feet were off the ground as he dived behind a tree. Pinpricks of amplified light peppered the bark on the other side, but he was safe for the moment.

Relax, he thought. It's just one humie patrol. The other humies in the camp don't know about us yet, 'cause I can't hear any Klaxon-fings. So if we just quickly kill this lot before their mates find out…

A high-pitched shrieking interrupted his train of thought. It was Weedy the Grot, his personal assistant. Weedy existed in a state of permanent defiance against the laws of natural selection – his innate reaction to hazardous situations was to scream at the top of his squeaky little voice and run around blindly in panicked circles, but for some inscrutable reason he remained alive and well to the present day. This odd trait may be the reason that his many Ork masters tended to trust him with important tasks, such as carrying their personal banners, servicing their favourite deffblastas, guiding bommsquigs to their intended target, or, in this case, operating the remote detonator for the explosives Boom was presumably still in the process of setting up in the humie command centre in the middle of the camp. In every instance but one – the current one, in fact – this had resulted in the gruesome death of the Ork master in question. Snikmug wasn't a superstitious Ork.

Nevertheless, he was a careful one. "Weedy, watch out!" he called as loudly as he dared. "Yer gunna drop da…"

Somewhere at the back of his mind, Snikmug had already subconsciously realised that his words were utterly powerless against the cruel machinations of fate. His subconscious, unsurprisingly, was right. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as, before his horrified eyes, Weedy tripped, dropped the detonator plunger-side down, then proceeded to fall heavily on top of it.

"Weedy! Nooooooooooooooooooo!!" Snikmug felt the syllables tear themselves clear of his throat, through his mouth and out into the evening air.

A great burst of orange flame lit up the night.

Snikmug smacked his thick green forehead in exasperation. The mission was botched beyond hope and he knew it. Now all the humies in the camp would be coming after them with burnas and big 'eavy dakkagunz and whatnot. They'd be lucky to escape alive.

Oh well, no point in subtlety now, not any more. "Run fer it, ladz!" he bawled at the top of his lungs. He sensed danger and ducked just in time as a sizzling bolt of plasma blasted half the tree he was hiding behind into white ash. Throwing himself sideways to avoid a second plasma bolt, Snikmug pulled out a big, heavy lobbin' choppa strapped to his back and hurled it at the plasma gunner with all his might. He did not stop to see what happened, but judging from the screams and the fizzing sounds of leaking plasma, he surmised that the throwing axe had sliced right through the humie's gun and also taken his arm off in the bargain.

Dodging gunfire left and right, Snikmug jumped behind a rocky outcrop where the rest of the Kommandos had gathered. The surviving ones, at any rate. Rok was injured and concussed, from the looks of it – Garok was carrying his limp form. Norg and Grobkosh were nowhere to be seen, and neither was Boom. The latter had most likely been killed by Weedy's premature detonation of his own bombs. Oh the irony.

Still, there would be time aplenty to feel sorry for their drinkin' mates later, Snikmug told himself. "Gibko, get burnin'," he ordered. "An' make a line uv it. Dat way da humies won't see us runnin'."

Gibko the Burna Boy nodded and bravely drew himself up over the rock formation. A lasbolt glanced off his sturdy welding mask. Hefting his burna up into a firing position, he carefully laid down a shower of burning chemicals in a long line across the clearing between the humies and the rocks where the Orks were hiding. The grass caught fire instantly, burning up into a wall of flames which gave off a choking, oily smoke. The Imperial Guard advance ground to a halt behind it.

"'Ere'z our chance, boyz!" said Snikmug. "Go!"

He sprang to his feet and took two steps forward. He froze in his tracks.

He was staring down the barrel of a massive battle cannon, the other end of which was connected to a Leman Russ tank. It was aimed directly at him and his Kommandos. The humie tank commander with his upper half sticking out of the top hatch had every sign of enjoyment pasted across his funny pink face as he swung a searchlight that illuminated the Orks in a radiant pool of white light.

Thinking quickly, Snikmug threw the closest thing he had at hand at the humie. The closest thing he did have at hand, as it turned out, was Weedy. The commander's cries of fury were muffled as Weedy attached himself to his face and began clawing and biting frantically. By the time the humie dropped down the hatch into the interior of the tank, with the frenzied Grot still firmly affixed to his face, the Kommandos were up and running in the opposite direction back towards the humie camp. The tank's gunners were shooting wildly, sending bursts of heavy bolter and lascannon fire arcing in every direction, which prevented the Kommandos from running onward right past the tank but thankfully failed to harm them otherwise. The battle cannon barked its report, once. Its immense shell missed the Orks cleanly and killed half a squad of Guardsmen instead.

All the better for us, thought Snikmug. He knew that it would take a while for the battle cannon to reload and fire again, especially so with Weedy causing havoc inside the tank, but he still wanted to get as far away from it as possible. Their only hope now was to fight through the humies, get into the camp and pray to Mork that there would be something with wheels somewhere in it that they could use as an impromptu getaway vehicle.

The Kommandos jumped through the wall of flame and headed straight on past the shocked humies on the other side. Three of them stood directly in the path of the mob. One was sensible enough to get out of the way. Snikmug cleaved through one of the others with his choppa and headbutted the third. Mr. Third fell stunned to the ground and was subsequently trampled to death under the boots of the Orks.

By now the humies were starting to shoot again. Kaz threw a stikkbomm at the nearest group and Gibko sent a stream of fire in the direction of another lot, buying the Kommandos enough time to reach the safety of the buildings in the humie camp. The boyz ducked behind a toolshed and took a moment to catch a breather.

The humie command centre was in flames. Evidently Boom's explosives had been in the right place at least when Weedy fell on the plunger. A number of humies were dancing around it trying to put the fire out. More humies were running to and fro trying to be helpful, but without much success.

Suddenly, a soot-black figure lurched out from around the corner of an adjacent building and headed straight towards the Kommandos. On reflex, Snikmug whipped out another lobbin' choppa, ready to throw, but lowered it a moment later. It was Boom, the group's demolitions expert. His skin was charred and blackened but he appeared to be alive. He must have been caught in the explosion but managed to shield himself from the worst of it somehow.

"Iz somefing wrong, boss?" he asked, a bit unnecessarily. "Da boomfings went bang before I…"

There was a loud kaboom as the toolshed was blown to smithereens by a battle cannon shell. The Leman Russ rolled into view, its guns trained on the suddenly very exposed and very vulnerable Orks. Snikmug was aware that a bunch of humies were approaching them from the other side where the command centre was. They undoubtedly had lots of big shooty gunz.

That's it, he thought. This is the end.

"Boss?" said the Kommandos in unison. Snikmug opened his mouth to say something but never got the chance to.

A reverberating 'wham' rang out from somewhere off to the side. An entire section of the fortifications surrounding the humie camp crumbled like pudding as an enormous battlewagon ploughed right through it and screeched to a halt next to the burning command centre. The Leman Russ pivoted around to face this new threat but was not fast enough. The Battlewagon's zzapgun flashed once, instantaneously reducing the humie tank to a pile of scrap metal. Then its big shootas opened up, hewing down every other Guardsmen in the vicinity in very short order.

The ramp of the battlewagon lowered and out stepped Gashbrak, the meanest, toughest and ugliest Nob under Warboss Badklaw's command. He waved his power klaw around in the air, roaring so loudly that Snikmug could have sworn the air warped around him.

"WAAAAGH! Yeah! Who'z wantz more!? WHO'Z WANTZ SUM MORE!?"

Whooping and hollering, the mob of Skarboyz he led stomped out of the battlewagon and eagerly joined their Nob as he stormed off in search of something else to kill.

Through the gap in the fortifications Snikmug could see faint outlines of kanz, dreadz and mobs of da boyz clanging through the evening haze towards the humie camp. He let out a sigh of relief he had been saving up in case something just like this happened. Saved in the nick of time, even if it was by Gashbrak. He headed off in search of Norg and Grobkosh.


	3. Chapter 2

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 2**_

Inquisitor Lucas St. Kristov of the Ordo Xenos stared at the screen in front of him and pondered his next course of action. Decisions were trickiest when there were a near-infinite number of choices, each likely to be as good or bad as the next. His mind worked in silence for a few moments, searching the depths of the brain for the best possible option. Tentatively, he picked up his electro-quill and scribbled a sentence onto the sensor slate in front of him. As he wrote, words flashed up onto the screen, one by one.

_The greatest irony is that those who dare to be different are not always the ones who really want to._

Yes, that looked good. A one-sentence paragraph. No commas. Stark contrast against previous paragraphs. Made a stronger impact on the reader, emphasising the point without excessive fanfare. The question now was whether to carry on developing it, or just to leave it there, hanging, as it were. St. Kristov sighed lightly in mild vexation. Writing. It was an activity that proved, repeatedly, to be far more challenging than hunting down enemies of the Imperium, despite common belief to the contrary.

His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a 'bingley bongley beep' sound effect from the computer, which was accompanied by a small notification box flashing up on-screen.

_You have 1 new message. Subject: Waaagh! Badklaw, URGENT. Sender: Tomcat._

He clicked 'Open'.

* * *

Silinde sat in calm meditation in the middle of a circle of spirit stones. All was still in the training chamber of the Shrine of Scorpions, deep within the Eldar Craftworld of Stel-Uit. The soft gurgle of running water flowed through his ears into his mind, but it was all part of the music of the Shrine and it did not disturb him. His Biting Blade lay on the ground before his crossed legs. His hands were folded together gracefully in a meditative gesture.

Then the spirit stones' glow intensified, and they began to emit a slight humming. This tiny noise would have been completely unnoticeable to most men, but Eldar hearing was many times sharper than that of humans'. And as the sound pierced the serenity of his soul, Silinde's concentration shattered like a stone through glass.

The blood rose in his vision. Before his eyes flashed scenes from the past. Daemons tearing their way through of a Warp Gate. The ground dyed red with Eldar blood. A forest where the trees themselves shrieked in unspeakable agony. The tentacles and multiple eyes of a Greater Daemon of Slaanesh. Staring, writhing, blinking, lashing, coiling, mocking, screaming…

In a single fluid motion, Silinde leapt to his feet and snatched up the Biting Blade, gripping its hilt in both hands and falling into a ready stance as phantom opponents lurched out of the haze to attack him. A primal howl tore forth from his throat as he finally lost all contact with reality and charged.

* * *

"Gud as new. Dat'll be two bags o' teef, Snikmug," said Dok Voldemork in his monotone, perpetually businesslike voice.

"Uh, thanks Dok… I fink," replied Snikmug as he forked over the teef somewhat uncertainly. He shot a side glance at the Dok's gurney, off which Grobkosh was slowly hauling himself, looking dazed and confused. Snikmug didn't blame him. Death tended to have that effect on greenskins and your average Ork would typically take an hour or two to get his wits back in order after being freshly restored to the world of the living.

By the time the Kommandos managed to hitch a ride back to the Hulk on Digzagga's Gunwagon, Snikmug had found Grobkosh and Norg, the former with a bayonet stuck in his throat and the latter with an autocannon round in the eye. Rok's injuries had been relatively minor and Snikmug had been able to treat them adequately on the Wagon journey back, but the other two needed attention from a Dok. Snikmug had brought them to Voldemork's clinic with a considerable amount of reluctance. It wasn't that the Mad Dok didn't know his stuff, because he did; it was just that most of the patients who came out of his clinic had considerably different physiologies than when they went in. Though to be fair to Voldemork, the same could be said of most other Orkish Doks and Painboyz.

Well, Grobkosh's throat wound had been patched up nicely. How an extra pair of arms could possibly have come into the equation escaped Snikmug.

It's not that bad, he told himself. I've seen worse before. At least he didn't end up with a squig for a brain…

"An' Norg?" asked Snikmug. "Where'z 'e got to?"

"'Over dere," answered Voldemork with a slight incline of his head. "'E'z prob'ly juz' gettin' used ta 'iz new leg."

Snikmug blinked. Last time he checked, his eye and his leg were nowhere near each other. "Leg?"

There came a clanking sound from somewhere within the shadows of one of the darker corners of Voldemork's clinic. Then something green and silver stumbled out of the gloom, tottered unsteadily for a moment and fell over, hitting the floor with a worrying crash. Bit by bit, it struggled up onto its feet and held out a hand to steady itself against the wall, except that where its hand used to be was now a built-in blasta. An energy bolt discharged abruptly from its shooty end, bouncing off the wall, penetrating a table and vaporising one of Voldemork's Grot orderlies working underneath it. "Whoops," said the figure sheepishly, in the characteristic monotone drone of cyborks.

Snikmug was at a loss for words. Somehow, Dok Voldemork had judged the best method of treating an eye injury to be removing an entire half of Norg's body and replacing it with cybork bitz. Perhaps the Dok thought that by cutting off the patient's left-hand side, he could make him all right.

"Off ya goez, den," said Voldemork, shooing them out of his clinic.

Wordlessly, Snikmug led his subordinates into the main corridor running along the lower deck of the Space Hulk _Abandon All Hope_, Waaagh! Badklaw's mobile base of operations which was currently aground on the highland plateaus of the garden world Exochora VI. Through a window in the side of the Hulk, Snikmug could see Orks packing up piles of loot and lugging them onboard by the crateful. And if they seemed to be in a bit of a rush, it was because the _Abandon All Hope_ would be leaving the planet shortly. The last humie encampments on Exochora VI had been stomped to dust that day, and Badklaw was eager to get stuck into more fighting on the neighbouring planet of Exochora VII. All that remained now was for Axis and his Mekboyz to re-wire the planet's power grid in order to channel enough energy into the Hulk for it to break free of the gravitational pull, and then the Orks would be off on their merry way. This conveniently left enough time for the resident Death Skullz to do some last-minute lootin', which they set about with a passion.

Snikmug checked his watch. It was still an hour or so until Weedy's psychorktherapy session was due to end. Since there wasn't much else to do in the meantime, he decided to go find the nearest pub for a drink and a quick bite.

(On a side note, Weedy had managed to survive the previous battle, against all probability and expectation. After severely mutilating the humie tank commander's face, he had evaded the blows aimed at him by other humies in the vehicle and escaped into the relative safety of the tank's engines, where he succeeded in avoiding being crushed by the heavy machinery. Miraculously, the zzapgun shot from Gashbrak's battlewagon failed to harm him and he simply crawled out of the wreckage of the tank before scampering off to rejoin Snikmug. Though physically unhurt, the experience had left him traumatised and gibbering incoherently, prompting Snikmug to send him off to Dok Rodjaz for psychorktherapy. Rodjaz was an unusual Dok who believed that 'self-concept' was important to good mental health in greenskins, a term which he defined as 'da org'nised consistent conceptual gestalt comprised o' da characteristikz o' 'I' or 'me' an' da percep'shunz o' da rela'shunshipz o' da 'I' or 'me' ta uvverz an' ta vari'uz aspektz o' life, togevva wiv da valuez attached ta deze percep'shunz.' His therapy sessions generally involved boring the hell out of the patient with complicated jargon until said patient agreed to cheer up and to stop actin' funny.)

The nearest pub turned out to be the Teef Smashed Out, located just a hundred metres or so down the main corridor and two doorways away from the junction where Dok Rodjaz's office was. As he approached the entrance, Snikmug hesitated ever so slightly. The Teef Smashed Out was especially popular with Skarboyz and Nobz. Not that he wasn't one, but the point was that the regulars at this pub tended to be the louder and more aggressive varieties of Ork. As a Kommando, he was, by nature, neither particularly loud nor aggressive by greenskin standards. In fact, as a former Blood Axe, he knew he carried the inglorious, stigmatising label of 'un-Orky', especially since the fact that he had grown up on a humie world was quite a well-known one. If brutes of the calibre of Urgkob or Azrag were there, they'd surely object to his presence. Probably the best thing to do was to go look for a less prominent pub somewhere else, even if it meant having to walk further to and fro.

Still… there shouldn't be too many customers in the pub at this time of day, and besides, he had just seen the Death Skullz bringing their loot in, which meant that most Nobz would probably be off redistributing the booty a little (though he personally disapproved of robbing others of their hard-earned riches). As long as he ensured that he was long gone by the time they got round to spending some of their newly-made wealth, everything should be fine. Snikmug, unlike most Orks, had no desire to create an unnecessary ruckus, even in a pub. It somehow just felt – bad.

Snikmug pushed the door open and stepped carefully inside. To his relief, all was calm. The pub was surprisingly empty, with only a small number of patrons who, atypically, were sitting or milling about minding their own business instead of screaming and hitting each other. This situation was almost unheard-of in such a pub as the Teef Smashed Out, and Snikmug thanked his luck that it had decided to occur precisely when he was trying to have a quiet drink somewhere without starting an argument.

He chose a seat at the countertop and ordered a tankard of fungus beer and a mushroom pie. Snikmug did not eat meat. The thought of putting dead bits of other sentient beings into his mouth and swallowing them repulsed him, though he knew all the arguments for doing so: humies and panzees were highly nutritious, it was part of good Orky tradition, and it wasn't really cannibalism anyway since they were different species. But it wasn't about rational argument. It was simply _wrong_. The very idea made him sick, and if it makes you sick, how could it possibly be a good thing? At one point Snikmug had eaten squigs, but later began to feel that the little critters didn't deserve to be on the wrong end of the food chain any more than humies or panzees did, so they had been dropped from his diet as well.

Snikmug's order came. He took a deep gulp of his beer and was halfway through his pie when the door flew open with a 'wham' that sounded suspiciously like a battlewagon ramming through a fortified wall.

Snikmug froze in half-chew. He slowly turned his head around, trying to sneak the tiniest, most inconspicuous peek possible at the new arrivals at the Teef Smashed Out. Inwardly, some part of him dared to hope that it wasn't who he thought it was, but no such luck.

It was, of course, none other than Gashbrak the Nob, flanked by his entire mob of Skarboyz. From the looks of it, they had been engaged in thirsty work quite recently, most likely beating up unfortunate Bad Moonz and taking their teef, and were now more or less ready to drink the pub dry. Snikmug lowered his head and folded his shoulders inward, trying to make himself smaller. Preferably small enough to avoid detection.

"FUNGUS BEER ALL ROUND!!" bellowed Gashbrak so loudly that glassware throughout the pub cracked. "WE WANTZ… Eh? Snikmug? Wot'z ya doin' 'ere, ya shifty git?"

If I concentrate hard enough maybe I'll wake up and this'll all be a dream…, prayed Snikmug fervently. His wishful thinking was rudely interrupted by Gashbrak's hand clapping heavily down on his shoulder and spinning him around a full 180 degrees along with his chair. Gashbrak was big even by Nob standards and towered over Snikmug, almost completely engulfing him in his shadow. The massive greenskin leered down at his latest victim.

"Well? Wot'z ya doin' 'ere den?" barked Gashbrak. "Diz a pub fer propa tough Orksez, not hob-nobbin' humie-luvvaz like you'z. Thinkz ya can sneak in 'ere wiv yer tricksy kam-o-flarge stuff an' drink our beer, eh? Yer a slimy Blood Axe! Dat's why I'z invited ta da Boss's big party an' you'z ain't! Cuz 'e don't trust ya none, see? An' dat's MY chair yer sittin' on!"

The next thing Snikmug knew, he was being hoisted off the chair and hurled bodily across the pub. He hit the wall with a terrifying crash, then fell to the ground in a dazed heap. Through the wobbly ringing in his ears, he could hear the scornful chorus of laughter from the Skarboyz and the light whistling sound of small objects being thrown through the air at him.

Gashbrak inspected the half-eaten pie on the counter, picking it up and holding it close to his eye while squinting inquisitively. After a few moments he laughed and crushed it in his fist. Small rivulets of gravy trickled down his forearm.

"Ya don't like meat, eh?" Gashbrak chortled. "Wot'z da matter? Tryin' ta be even more humie? Or are ya juz' a puny little wimp like softy Klank?"

Klank, the 'Ardboyz Nob, happened to be in the pub at the time. A former Stormboy, he had the reputation of being easily annoyed even amongst a generally bad-tempered race, and was almost always upset about one thing or another. When Klank was under stress, two things happened: either he started obsessive-compulsively polishing his 'eavy armour, or people died. Around the time when Gashbrak had entered the Teef Smashed Out, he had been lamenting the lack of a handy can of armour polish anywhere nearby. That neatly eliminated the first option. And Gashbrak's comment hardly improved his mood.

"Who yer callin' softy, squigbrain?" he growled, drawing himself up to his feet.

Gashbrak whirled on him. "Ah, put a sock in it, will ya? Call yerself a Nob, ya can't even get stuck in a fight wivvout wearin' two metres o' metal over you'z!"

Klank's eyes flared. With a snarl of rage, he grabbed his massive, two-handed choppa from where it had been resting against a table and lunged at Gashbrak. The surrounding area quickly descended into chaos as the rest of the Orks suddenly found various scores they had to settle with each other and a full-on pub brawl erupted.

Crouched low, Snikmug discreetly made his way to the pub's back exit as darts, beer bottles, choppas and chairs sailed through the air above him. Edging the door open only as far as it was necessary for him to slip out, he left the noise and mayhem of the brawl behind him and walked slowly down a side corridor outside, feeling utterly dejected and miserable.


	4. Chapter 3

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 3**_

A Space Hulk is a gargantuan conglomeration of numerous asteroids, starships and space stations, all merged into a single form. The _Abandon All Hope_, used by Waaagh! Badklaw as an interstellar base of operations,was no exception to this rule, and it was on the upper decks of what used to be a Retribution-class battleship of the Imperial Navy that Badklaw made his command hub. The bladelike structure of the vessel jutted out of the metallic assembly at an angle, like a leaning tower atop a knoll, offering those at its highest point a commanding view over the rest of the Hulk below.

Many years ago, when Badklaw was still a Freebooter captain instead of the Warboss of one of the galaxy's more notorious Waaagh!s, he had terrorized the length and breadth of Ultramar and beyond aboard the very same battleship, stolen from the Imperial dockyards near Tallassar. It had undergone many refits and modifications over the course of Badklaw's illustrious pirating career, and when he finally acquired the _Abandon All Hope_, an action which signified his transition from buccaneer to warlord, he ordered the battleship to be welded to the top of the Hulk like a sort of crow's nest from where he could watch his enemies being blasted to bits by the cannons of the Hulk beneath him.

It was in the staterooms of this Battleship, once known as the _Vengeful_ in times long past, that Badklaw was now preparing to throw the biggest party the Waaagh! had seen in a while. To any human who could witness the event and live to talk about it afterwards – and there was one such individual – it would seem, on first sight, to be a kind of victory celebration, which would make sense as the Orks had just very recently wiped out the entire population of Exochora VI. But this observation was, in reality, incorrect. While it is true that Orks do immensely enjoy wiping out planetary populations, they took considerably less pleasure in thinking about how they did it after they had, and so the party Badklaw was about to throw was more of an anticipatory nature than a triumphant one. In other words, the main reason for the party was to rejoice in the soon-to-be slaughter of quite a lot of humies on the neighbouring planet of Exochora VII, rather than rejoicing in the had-been slaughter of a moderately smaller number of humies on Exochora VI. Such is the forward-looking attitude of the Orks that they can so easily leave the violent and bloodstained past behind them and optimistically strive for the violent and bloodstained future ahead of them instead.

"Drink up, ladz!" roared Badklaw cheerfully, breaking open a keg of his best grog with a choppa. The assembled audience shouted their approval, pumping rough green fists into the air in sheer elation. Strobe lights flashed psychedelic radiance all across the room, setting the mood for the Orks to boogie around, drinking as though there were no tomorrow as music blared from loudspeakers installed at intervals on the walls. The songs chosen were the latest from the 'eavy metal world, including Da Orkamatik's hit single "Wot'z dat comin' over da hill?" and Billy Shoota's remix of the golden oldie "'Ere we go". The ear-splitting noises of machinery, gunfire and Gargant construction drove the Orks into a frenzy, and the dancing and drinking picked up momentum, increasing to a frightening tempo.

The staterooms of the Imperial Battleship were cavernously large, a fact that Badklaw was grateful for as it allowed him to invite every Nob in the Waaagh! to his party. Almost every, at any rate. In fact, all but one. But it wasn't as though anyone was going to _miss_ Snikmug, now was it?

* * *

The Eldar Craftworld of Stel-Uit sailed gracefully through the stars, its beautiful wraithbone construction shimmering silent blue light. Its glow was clean, fresh and purifying, and seen from a distance it could very well have been mistaken for an angel incarnate. But though in outward lustre it was practically the very picture of perfection, there was something, unseen, about it that was very wrong indeed. For reasons not even the Eldar themselves could comprehend, the Craftworld's navigation system was somehow malfunctioning. Its course had suddenly veered sharply away from the designated one, and no matter how many times this was corrected, it inexorably veered away again in the same direction. A puzzling and worrying occurrence.

At such a time, of course, it fell to the Farseers to divine the nature of the disturbance that ailed the Infinity Circuit of the Craftworld. It was not an easy task, even for these talented beings who had had centuries to refine their skill, but after days of scrying it was tentatively announced that some answers had revealed themselves. An emergency summons was sent around, calling for a meeting of the Craftworld's elders on short notice. It was answered by all who received it.

Within the grand council chamber of the Craftworld, nestled high up within the shining peaks and spires that rose out of the top of the colossal spaceship, the Ruling Council of Stel-Uit gathered.

As the elders eased themselves into their seats, murmuring amongst themselves, Farseer Teldor strode purposefully onto the elevated podium in the centre of the chamber and stood quietly with his hands folded. Moments later, Senior Councillor Enelya called the meeting to order with a wave of her hand and the buzz of conversation gradually died down.

"Explain, Farseer," said Enelya in her melodious, faraway voice. "What is the cause of the guidance failure in our Craftworld?"

"Your Grace," answered Teldor respectfully. "The signs are yet uncertain at this point, but it seems that there is some _presence_ in the void beyond drawing Stel-Uit towards it. I have repeatedly inspected the Infinity Circuit and there is nothing at fault within the Craftworld itself, therefore there must be some external force acting on us."

"And what do you propose this external force to be?" asked a voice sternly.

"I do not know," said Teldor. "We have had difficulty in our divinations as some power from the Warp appears to be blocking our senses. But I have seen visions of Vaul and Asuryan during my invocations, and for the Circuit to react so strongly to it… my instinct tells me that whatever it is, it may be of Eldar origin."

A silence fell over the council chamber. Councillors exchanged uneasy glances with each other.

"Well, if that is so, perhaps it may be worth following this trail to discover what it is," said a voice eventually.

"That may not be wise," countered another voice. "Even if this 'presence' is indeed Eldar in nature, it could be a trap to lure us to our doom."

"It may be a lost relic or an artefact of the gods," argued the first voice. "If fate and the Circuit lead us towards it, then surely it must be our mission to retrieve it?"

"Many artefacts have fallen into the hands of the Great Enemy," said a third voice. "We have not the numbers or resources to go chasing blindly after every little sign…"

"Councillors," Teldor's voice cut through the rising hum of discussion. Enelya motioned for silence. "I take no delight in being the bearer of dire news, but we must put this matter aside for the moment as there is a more pressing threat at hand. A greater and darker presence casts its reflection in the Warp, and unlike the external force drawing us in, it is actively approaching us at an alarming rate. It will make contact with the Craftworld soon, and it is imperative that we take measures to halt it now, or I fear that the strands of fate will lead us to destruction."

"What is this threat you speak of, Teldor?" questioned Enelya.

"Observe," said Teldor, pulling out his seeing crystal from within his robes and holding it high for all to see. The clear stone shone gently with an inner light, the emblem of Stel-Uit vaguely visible at its core, but then colour began oozing in from one side of the orb. First just a trace, a dark tendril reaching experimentally into the sanctity of the crystal. Then more followed, seeping in and quickly gaining speed, consuming the light and spreading everywhere until it obscured the orb completely, swallowing the Craftworld's emblem in the process. The Council sat in stunned silence.

The colour that had darkened the crystal was a familiar one to many of them. It was a very special shade of green. Ork green.

* * *

Inquisitor Lucas St. Kristov sat at his desk in his private quarters aboard the Mars-class battlecruiser_Iron Will_. A holographic projector was active on the desk in front of him. It projected a hologram, 30 centimetres tall, of a masked figure clad in a form-fitting power suit.

"I can't keep up this connection for long, my lord." The figure's voice crackled heavily with distortion, but St. Kristov reckoned he could make out worry in its tone. "It's dangerous enough as it is, the longer I spend chatting the more likely I'll get caught. And you don't exactly want that, do you?"

"I won't keep you," promised St. Kristov. "But listen… are you telling me that the Orks have annihilated Exochora VI already?"

"Absolutely," said the figure. "As a matter of fact, the Space Hulk's on its way to Exochora VII even now."

"Damn!" breathed St. Kristov. "I was expecting them to take longer. This means that they'll be there in about three days! Those reinforcements are never going to arrive on time! If that Space Hulk lands, it'll be a disaster."

"Tell me something I don't know," said the figure a little sarcastically. "So, what's the clever plan this time?"

"I need some time to think," said St. Kristov. "I'll be in contact."

"Right you are," answered the figure. "Signing off now."

St. Kristov leaned back in his chair moodily. Exochora VII was a densely populated Hive World. It wasn't unguarded, but Waaagh! Badklaw had overwhelmed far greater forces than its meagre planetary defences. If the Orks were to make planetfall on Exochora VII, they would undoubtedly massacre the entirety of its populace. Several hundred billion human lives would be lost, and that was something St. Kristov simply would not stand for. He had requested reinforcements from the Imperial Guard and Navy, but even the closest ones would take at least two weeks to arrive. By the time they did, it would be too late to prevent the genocide.

_There must be something I can do…_ he thought. There was a strange, nebulous feeling tugging at the back of his mind. A normal human being would have ignored it, reasoning it as tiredness or some such, but St. Kristov had been a psyker for too long not to know what such a feeling meant. He closed his eyes and relaxed his body, allowing his consciousness to wander into the Warp.

As he entered the realm of Chaos, he felt the psychic turmoil of sheer emotion boil and bubble all around him. Daemons lurked at the edges of his perception, waiting for a chance to devour his soul. Tortured spirits screeched in anguish, their ghostly forms bending and twisting at impossible angles. The very fabric of the universe pulsated in non-existent colours. It was a maddening experience, enough to destroy the cognitive functioning of most men, but St. Kristov's mind was indestructible and it moved through the Warp undeterred.

Then the visions came, filling his thoughts with snapshots of the future. He saw the unmanned ships, floating silently in orbit around Exochora VI. He saw the Eldar Craftworld of Stel-Uit. And he saw something else, a huge machine floating through space, glossy black and looking for all the world like a massive eight-pointed star…

His eyes snapped open.

* * *

Later on in the day, Snikmug found out that he'd been banned indefinitely from the Teef Smashed Out. It was fine for Gashbrak even though he was the one who caused the most damage, thought the Kommando resentfully. He'd even received a free drink and a shoota for his trouble. Instead of blaming the one who'd started the fight in the first place and destroyed half the pub, everyone blamed the humie-luvvin', un-Orky git who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was all right for Gashbrak. It was never his fault. That was because Gashbrak was the very picture of the ideal Ork, a living list of all the things Orky society expected of its members. Every yoof wanted to be just like Gashbrak when they grew up.

Everyone always seemed to be on Gashbrak's side, since as far back as Snikmug could remember… He remembered the first day he had joined the Waaagh!, that fateful day when Badklaw had saved him and his boyz from almost certain death, adrift in their little space pod with no fuel and no supplies. He remembered helping to raze the humie settlement on the nearby planet that very day. And he remembered Gashbrak's challenge.

"Go on an' do it," the Skarboyz Nob had said. "Den ya'll be one uv uz, eh?"

Snikmug remembered the sullen eyes gazing back at him, trying to mask their fear with hate. He refused Gashbrak's challenge. In his eyes – their eyes – the refusal was no different from failure.

Gashbrak's laughter had started then, first a chuckle but then quickly turning into his signature laugh, long, loud and derisive. The other Nobz knew which side of the choppa their teef were balanced on and wasted little time in joining in. Since then Snikmug had carried the disgraceful, and above all, sticky label of "humie-luvvin', un-Orky git".

* * *

Lucas St. Kristov was writing again. More specifically, he was drawing a spidergram. He had a problem to solve and he knew he had all the information he needed to solve it, the only problem now was sorting it all out in a meaningful way.

Problem #1: Waaagh! Badklaw is preparing to attack Exochora VII. If they are allowed to reach the planet it will lead to an unacceptable number of deaths of Imperial citizens. The Waaagh! will make contact in three days. Reinforcements are two weeks away.

Problem #2: There is a Blackstone Fortress in the vicinity. Its Warp Core is active, giving out an immense psychic signature. An Eldar Craftworld has drifted into range of this signature, which is drawing the Craftworld towards it. The Eldar cannot be allowed to discover what it is, either by divination or by actually reaching it. But the closer they get to it, the stronger the Fortress's attractive force will be. Somehow, they must be persuaded to leave the system completely, out of the Fortress's radius of influence.

A possible solution to problem #1 was the presence of a large number of abandoned freighter vessels left at the orbital dockyards around Exochora VI. He could have them commandeered by the crew aboard the _Iron Will_ and they should be enough to evacuate the majority of citizens from Exochora VII. If this is accomplished before the Waaagh! arrives, the Orks would find a deserted planet, get bored and simply leave. However, it would take at least six days to carry out this operation.

A possible solution to problem #2 was to use his own powers to block the divinations of the Eldar Farseers. St. Kristov was a Beta-level psyker bordering on becoming Alpha-level, so it should be a relatively simple matter for him to disrupt the psychic probings of the Eldar. However, the Infinity Circuit of the Craftworld could not be fooled and would continue steering the Craftworld towards the Blackstone Fortress. If the Eldar took manual control they could conceivably pilot the Craftworld far enough to break away from the Fortress's psychic signature, but something truly radical would have to happen before they did so.

The resources at his disposal were insufficient for him to face either the Orks or the Eldar head-on on the field of battle. All he had was himself, his retinue, a battlecruiser, its crew and two squads of Inquisitorial storm troopers.

Or did he?

Something was missing from his spidergram. Was there something else he had that wasn't on the _Iron Will_ itself, and yet was still close enough to be useful?

Of course he did. He had Tomcat. Good old Tomcat. The final piece of the puzzle clicked into place.

He knew now what had to be done. The Orks had to be diverted away from Exochora VII. He would guide them right into the path of the Eldar Craftworld. The Orks and the Eldar would battle each other, buying him enough time to carry out the evacuation of Exochora VII's citizens. Whether the Eldar won or not, they would sustain great losses and find themselves forced to disengage from the system. That would take them out of the Blackstone Fortress's influence without them ever learning of its presence. And if the Orks did win, they would have taken a long, long detour to get to Exochora VII and when they arrived, they would find nothing left there for them to fight.

The last problem, namely finding out the exact means by which the Space Hulk's course could be redirected, was one best left to someone who was good at that sort of thing.


	5. Chapter 4

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 4**_

The two Flyboyz responsible for piloting the Space Hulk _Abandon All Hope_ were named Gizgaz and Dugnuk. Presently they weren't doing very much piloting, however. Why should they be? It was just a straight line from Exochora VI to Exochora VII, short-haul flight, no cavorting about in the Warp. All that was required of them was to spin the steering wheel until the Hulk was pointing roughly in the direction of the intended destination, lash it in place with some string and a rubber band, and sit back and relax… at least until the view of the planet started getting ominously big.

Gizgaz and Dugnuk had not been invited to Badklaw's party, which was hardly surprising as they were expected to be keeping their eyes on the horizon for trouble, and were passing the time by playing cards and drinking canned, watery fungus beer.

"Four uv a kind!" cackled Gizgaz, playing a hand containing the Nobz of all four suits and the Mekboy of Stikkbommz. "Lookz like I winz diz round, eh?"

"Wait a minute…" Dugnuk took a swig of fungus beer and glared intently at the cards in his own hand. The Nob of Sluggaz and the Nob of Teef stared back at him. "Dat ain't roight! Ya can't have four, cheata!"

"Who ya callin' cheat, cheat?" said Gizgaz hotly. "I'z got dealt deze cards fair n' square!"

"Last time I'z checked dere weren't six Nobz inna deck," said Dugnuk, showing Gizgaz his hand. "Where'd da uvver two come from den, eh?"

"Why'z ya askin' me, git?"

"You woz dealin'!"

The two Orks leapt to their feet simultaneously and grabbed each other by the throat. They were just about to start fighting when the door of the control room slid open and a huge, intimidating Nob stomped in. Somehow, his stomp wasn't quite your typical Nob stomp but precisely how it was wrong was hard to say.

"What's all dis den, eh boys?" he rumbled.

The Flyboyz let go of one another hurriedly. Each pointed an accusing finger at the other. "Dugnuk's (Gizgaz's) fault!" they chorused.

"Fools," thundered the Nob, dealing the two smaller greenskins each a mighty blow on the head. The unconscious Flyboyz slumped limp to the ground.

The Nob stood thoughtfully in the sudden silence of the control room for a moment, gazing out of the forward porthole. Then its mouth twisted into a smile, a self-satisfied smirk. Orks did not smirk.

Then the Nob's body began changing, subtly shifting bit by bit. Its physical frame shrank, bulging muscles regressing into slender limbs and bulky torso taking on un-Orky proportions. Its large green head also gradually reduced in size – the ears became rounded, and hair grew from its bald scalp. Within half a minute, a lithe, unmistakably human figure in a form-fitting power suit with a matching facemask stood where the Nob had been shortly before.

The Callidus Assassin known to most simply by the codename 'Tomcat' had received surgical implants which, when used in combination with polymorphine, allowed the physical makeup of any Orkoid to be mimicked flawlessly. For the task at hand, however, the dexterity of human fingers may be needed, prompting Tomcat to shift back to homo sapiens form.

The Assassin walked up to the control panel. A row of three buttons, a wheel and a gear stick with only two gears – not terribly complicated, but undeniably quite sufficient. The wheel was firmly held in place by some bits of string and a rubber band.

A digital readout on Tomcat's wrist device specified the coordinates towards which the Space Hulk must be positioned in order for it to encounter Craftworld Stel-Uit before the Eldar reached the Blackstone Fortress. All that had to be done was to unfix the steering wheel, set the Hulk on the right course and replace the bits of string and the rubber band exactly as they had been. Piece of cake, really. Hardly worth an Assassin's time. But Lucas St. Kristov was an Inquisitor and you tended to obey men like him…

* * *

Where was it?

Farseer Teldor was an individual of exceptional patience – Isha knew he'd had half a millennium to learn to be the one who waited for those good things to come – but even he had to admit that this entire affair was beginning to grate on his nerves. The _thing_ that was reeling in Stel-Uit like a hapless fish was unshielded from psychic scrying, he was certain of it. And yet every time he reached out with his mind to discern its nature, invisible hands stretched forth from somewhere within the Warp, bending his mental probes away from their path. It was most infuriating.

Someone wanted the object kept secret from the Eldar. They thought they were being clever by blocking his divinations, but to Teldor this was merely proof that whatever it was, it was harmless and most likely rightfully belonged to the Eldar. He promised himself that after the Orks had been dealt with, he would urge the Council to allow the Craftworld to seek it out. They would claim it for themselves and use it against those who would dare think themselves superior to the Eldar.

Speaking of the Orks, the Council had agreed, earlier that day, on a course of action to halt their advance on the Craftworld. They would send an assassin to secretly board the Space Hulk, seek out the Ork Warboss and exterminate him. The sudden lack of a strong leader should cause rival groups of Orks to take arms against each other, and with some luck, the Waaagh! would destroy itself through internal conflict. Any stragglers who persisted in attacking Stel-Uit would be easy to deal with.

Teldor was aware, however, that the assassin chosen was Silinde. A highly controversial choice, as everyone knew that the Striking Scorpions Exarch was raving mad, given to psychotic seizures at the slightest provocation. On the other hand, though, his fighting skills were second to none on the Craftworld and he was a master of Arhra's Shadowstrike technique. If anyone had any hope of sneaking on board a Space Hulk and defeating an Ork Warboss in combat, it was Silinde. It went without saying that his reliability was practically zero, since all it took was one berserker fit to ruin the whole plan, but the arguments for him had prevailed in the end. At least nobody else was going with him, thank the gods, thought Teldor. Stel-Uit could ill afford to lose any Eldar lives by the hand of one of her own inhabitants.

Naturally, Silinde would have to know where the target was before embarking on his mission, as it would be sheer folly to search the entirety of a Space Hulk for a single Ork, especially when the damned things all looked so similar. Once again, it became Teldor's responsibility to psychically ascertain the location of the Warboss. He saw it as a welcome distraction from the frustrating investigation of the unknown object. Shifting his focus, he turned his psychic presence away and directed it towards the Orkish Hulk instead, seeking out the strongest mind aboard. The strongest mind would represent the biggest Ork, and surely, that had to be the Warboss.

* * *

Snikmug was dragging a big bucket of leftover food down to the prison decks. He'd found out, some time ago, that feeding the prisoners had a highly therapeutic effect when he was in a bad mood and had nothing much else to do. Maybe it was something to do with getting to throw things at people who actually thanked you for it. Right now, the other Nobz would all be having the time of their lives at Badklaw's party. And he hadn't been invited. The only Nob in the entire Waaagh! not to have been invited. He knew that even if he was, he probably wouldn't have gone since he wouldn't have been able to enjoy himself anyway. He could never get into the spirit of the thing, somehow. But there was still a difference between not going and not invited.

He paused momentarily as a blinding flash of blue-green light, accompanied by a frightening bang, erupted forth from a half-open doorway he happened to be passing by. The sign on the door read, "AXiS'z MeKShoP". Snikmug didn't like Axis. The Big Mek had joined Waaagh! Badklaw shortly after he had, and had the most disturbing leer he had ever seen. When that leer was combined with a creepy glint in the eye, it meant that he was up to something. Axis was always up to something. He had joined Waaagh! Badklaw entirely of his own free will, like a bolt from the blue and for no good reason at all. The warbikes and warbuggies he built were a tremendous asset to the Waaagh!, that was true, but Snikmug could not help but feel that the shifty Mek had some ulterior motive hidden up his oily sleeves.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Weedy scurrying down the corridor towards him. He turned to look, and saw that the little Gretchin had two teef bags slung over his shoulder. Two Ork-sized teef bags. In other words, containing more and larger teef than any Grot would normally have.

"Hey, boss, look what I'z found," squeaked Weedy. "Gizgaz an' Dugnuk woz lyin' aroun' all sleepy-like an' dey didn't say nuffink when I'z poked 'em so I'z took all dere teef. How much o' diz ya wantz?"

"Weedy! You'z put dat back where ya found it, roight now ya hear?" snapped Snikmug reproachfully. He barely realised what he was saying until the words had left his mouth, and immediately smacked himself mentally for it. He'd sounded just a bit too much like someone he knew…

Weedy blinked at him in clueless Grotty incomprehension. It said something about Weedy that even his blink was high-pitched and pathetic. "But why, boss?" he squealed. "It ain't like dey'z gonna know who took da teef…"

"Ya can't juz' take uvver people's stuff when dey ain't lookin', Weedy," lectured Snikmug, stubbornly ignoring his inner Ork yelling at him to shut up. "Coz it belongz ta dem, see, an' dey ain't given it ta you'z so it ain't yourz…"

"But I'z nicked it wivvout dem findin' out." Weedy's voice was puzzled, not argumentative. He was stating a fact of common knowledge, not engaging in philosophical discussion. (Not that he could even if he wanted to, he could barely grasp the concept of counting numbers on his fingers as it was.) "Dat meanz I'z getz ta keep it, no?"

"Dat'z…" Snikmug was struggling now. How do you explain that permanent appropriation of someone else's property without legal consent is morally incorrect, especially to a Grot? When you really got down to it, ethics never stood much chance against simple logic anyway, and if you factored in the issue that Orky language did not even have words for 'morality', 'social justice' or 'stealing is wrong', it collapsed entirely.

Snikmug gave up. "Juz'… giv' it back, okay? Or I tellz Dok Rodjaz yer still talkin' funny."

Weedy blanched and took off down the corridor as fast as he could go.

It was only after the Grot completely disappeared from sight that Snikmug really started digesting what he had been told. Gizgaz and Dugnuk lying around all sleepy-like? That was unlikely. They'd never fall asleep on the job. They knew better than anyone else they'd get a right good thump on the noggin' if the Boss caught them having a snooze when they were supposed to be flying the Hulk. But if they weren't asleep, how could Weedy possibly have taken their teef? Unless someone knocked them out…

Then something moved. There was no noise, but Snikmug felt the slightest possible disturbance in the air behind him. He whirled around, just in time to see something disappear, very inconspicuously, into a storage room off one side of the corridor. Orks were not naturally inconspicuous creatures. If an Ork could, or come to think of it, would, move in an even remotely inconspicuous manner, they'd be a Kommando. Snikmug happened to be the boss of every Kommando there was on the Hulk (a stunning grand total of nine) and he was sure it wasn't any of his Boyz.

That meant there was an intruder aboard the _Abandon All Hope_. And it was just a bit too much of a coincidence that Gizgaz and Dugnuk had been mysteriously knocked out.

Snikmug drew his choppaz and stealthily entered the storage room.

It was dark inside. Untidy rows of shelves holding various bits and bobs and crates stacked randomly about offered a near-endless number of hiding places, but there was no back exit. Snikmug's Kommando mind quickly took in the situation, and he found that he knew exactly what to do. He'd never manage to sniff out the intruder if he tried properly searching through the place, but if he could trick them into giving themselves away, he knew where they'd be headed for…

He started poking and kicking at random crates and containers, shouting loudly as if he had no better plan in mind other than poking, kicking and shouting. He had to make the intruder think he was some stupid yob in order for this to work. And as he continued to kick and shout, he moved himself along a calculated route which took him away from the door while also keeping it clearly within his sight.

Nothing happened for several minutes. Snikmug was just about to give up and start thinking up a new plan when a flicker of motion caught his attention. Once again, it made no sound at all, but Snikmug was very good at noticing non-auditory indicators of a potential enemy's presence. His arm shot out, flinging his choppa at the indistinct blur swiftly making its way towards the partially open doorway.

The choppa missed its target, bouncing off the metal wall and landing on the floor with a clatter, but it accomplished what Snikmug had hoped it would: the intruder stopped, just for one split second, to evade it. That split second was enough time for Snikmug to dash over and grab him by the scruff of the neck.

"Gotcha, ya little runt!" he snarled as he lifted his catch off its feet, holding it high up where he could see it clearly. To his slight surprise, it was a Grot. At least, it looked like one. He wasn't entirely sure what, but there was something that simply wasn't quite right about it.

"Nonononononono! Nonono! Please! Please don't hurt me!" screeched the diminutive green creature, struggling hysterically.

Snikmug didn't buy the act. Most Grotz tended to freeze in fear rather than struggle when being lifted off the ground by a Nob, and besides, they said "'urtz", not "hurt".

"Wot are yer?" he demanded. "Speak up!"

The Grot gave no intelligible answer, but carried on pleading and flailing around relentlessly. He's deliberately avoiding the question, Snikmug realised. It's almost like he's trying to distract me from…

Too late.

Snikmug felt a short, sharp shock of pain pierce his torso. He looked down. The Grot had stabbed a small dagger right into his thorax, below the chest. Only… the hand clutching the dagger was not a Gretchin's hand, but a human hand. He looked back up. The Grot's face was still a Grot's face, but it had a very un-Grotty smirk plastered across it.

Tricksy little bugger, are we?, thought Snikmug angrily. But it'll take more than your dinky knife to harm me… He tried to open his mouth to laugh, but his jaw muscles would not obey. He suddenly felt weak.

The poison coursed rapidly through his blood, spreading like wildfire all over his body and shutting down metabolism wherever it went. His vision swam, blurred, and finally went black.


	6. Chapter 5

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 5**_

"DRINK! DRINK! DRINK! DRINK!"

By now, over a third of the guests were lying unconscious on the floor of the Imperial battleship's staterooms, but Badklaw's party showed no sign of losing momentum. Quite the opposite, in fact. The drunken singing and fighting continued with an even greater frenzy than before, and the music was being cranked up to such deafening volumes it would have made a Necron bleed from the ears.

"More ale 'ere!" shouted Badklaw at the world around him in general. Moments later, a small Grot came running up with a tray bearing mugs of the foaming liquid. He held it out, offering it to the towering Ork above him with an odd smirk stretched across his face.

Something's not quite right about this Grot, Badklaw found himself thinking absently as he took the mugs and passed them round to his drinking mates. He quickly shook it off, however, when he caught sight of Ringa Ringa, crouched sulkily in a corner and rocking back and forth on his heels unhappily.

"'Ere, you'z 'ave one too," Badklaw told him, shoving a mug into his hands and ushering him over to the group. "Come on, yer ol' bugger, give us a grin!"

"I'z sick…" mumbled Ringa Ringa vaguely. Badklaw studied the Weirdboy's face for a moment and decided that he was indeed looking a little green… er, unwell, that is. Nothing wrong with being green.

"Yer'll feelz betta after a drink," reassured Badklaw.

No I won't, thought Ringa Ringa, too ill to talk. Group events always make me sick. I can't help it. It's because of the funny green waves bouncing around the place, they get into my head and make me wish I were dead.

The Weirdboy started edging away from the circle of Nobz, wanting to get back into the relative comfort and safety of the corner before his condition worsened, but no such luck.

"Bottomz up, ladz!" bellowed Badklaw. "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!"

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!" chorused the Nobz.

Imagine, if you will, the mind of an Orkish Weirdboy as a sort of invisible green balloon. When Orks are shouting, fighting or generally having a good time, they release their subconscious psychic energy, known as the Waaagh!, into the surrounding environment. This gestalt energy will automatically head for the closest Weirdboy and gather in his brain, as though air were being pumped into the balloon. As more air continues to be pumped in, sooner or later the internal buildup of pressure will exceed the maximum tolerance allowed by the balloon's elasticity and it will explode in a spectacular fashion – which, incidentally, is precisely what happens to Weirdboyz who fail to vent out the accumulation of Waaagh! energy by casting a spell of some sort.

Ringa Ringa had seen soaking in the raw psychic energy given out by the partying Orks all evening and was feeling utterly dreadful. His balloon was close to breaking point, and a gaggle of screaming Nobz hardly helped either. His head throbbed painfully. He knew, with an all-too-familiar sense of certainty, that it was going to explode any moment now. He had to let it all out, all at once. Right now.

Small green arcs of green lightning were crackling off his skin and his eyes burned with a wild light as the barely-suppressed energies struggled to fight their way out. The Nobz were sucking in breath for another WAAAAAAAAGH! Green waves took form and began heading towards him, breaking over each other in their haste to get inside his skull…

He couldn't take it any more. He opened his mouth wide and vomited an immense, shapeless cloud of pure psychic energy into the Warp.

* * *

Hideous, thought Farseer Teldor. Truly a spacecraft fitting for none but the crudest, most barbaric race we Eldar have had the misfortune to encounter.

His spiritual form hovered, imperceptible, above the _Abandon All Hope_. His physical body, however, lying motionless back on Craftworld Stel-Uit, cringed momentarily in horror at the sight of the ugly metallic bulk that was home-away-from-home for the Orks of Waaagh! Badklaw. For a moment he felt tempted to cancel the divination and hurry off to the nearest spirit well to wash his eyes out, trying to forget that he had ever laid them on such a repulsive sight, but managed to rein himself in before he did so. He continued the search.

He could not actually _see_ the Orks as they were, of course – they were too far away for even his most powerful Farsight spell to reach, but all living creatures projected reflections of their consciousness into the Warp, even greenskins, and it was these that could be observed, hazy green silhouettes of thought and emotion to the eye of his mind within the Immaterium.

How strange, mused Teldor as he noticed something unexpected. The entire top section of the Hulk appeared to be completely uninhabited.

Proud and haughty as the next Eldar, perhaps even more so, Teldor knew nothing about Orkish psykers at all since he simply refused to believe in their existence. Had he known, he might have suspected, but him being him, the thought never crossed his mind that the apparent lack of Orks on the upper decks may have been the manifestation of a Weirdboy's psychic powers.

What he didn't know, and what would later come to cost him dearly, was that the cloud of Waaagh! energy vomited up by Ringa Ringa took the effect of masking the psychic reflections of Orks within its area of influence, such that they could not be seen by psychic divination. Teldor, assuming too much like he often did, entirely overlooked the possibility that this peculiar occurrence may have represented a psychic mind shield rather than a real absence of Orks in the material universe.

He could never have guessed that the Warboss he was looking for was actually standing right in the middle of the area of nothingness, having a nice drink.

* * *

The plan seemed to be working perfectly so far. Tomcat had successfully set the Orkish Space Hulk on a dead collision course with the Eldar Craftworld, and now there was nothing left for Inquisitor St. Kristov to do but sit around and wait patiently for the results.

Well, almost nothing, anyway. There was always tutoring his disciples in the art of becoming an Inquisitor, but that was a constant.

St. Kristov had two acolytes under his wing who followed him as he travelled across the galaxy, carrying out the eternal mission to seek and destroy the enemies of the Imperium. They accompanied him on his operations, learning vital skills through experience and exposure, but there was also much theoretical knowledge that had to be imparted through tutorial sessions, which were held regularly in the studies of the _Iron Will_.

St. Kristov fixed each of them with a scrutinizing eye as they silently entered the room and took their seats. Interrogator Darius Kelman was the younger of the two, quiet, pensive and incisively intelligent. He had once been a member of the Ecclesiarchy, a missionary-in-training, and had spent some years attached to the Sisters Hospitalliers where he earned considerable skill as a medic; Interrogator Grazien Balhador, a former Commissar, was fiery, hot-headed, and lost his temper on a regular basis. He was a dogmatic believer in the Imperial Creed, and not only jumped, but virtually leapt and bounded at the tiniest chance of getting to bring divine retribution to the heretic, mutant and alien.

"Welcome again," started Inquisitor St. Kristov. "Today, we'll be covering the biochemical action of polymorphine, used, as you know, exclusively by the Callidus Temple of the Officio Assassinorium. I hope you've read your preparatory material. Before we start, are there any questions?"

"Yes," said Interrogator Kelman meekly. "Why are all Callidus assassins female?"

"Not all, Mr. Kelman, not all," corrected St. Kristov. "No, not by a long shot. You see, the Callidus temple trains its assassins to be able to achieve total empathy with a subject. This is essential in order for them to be able to use polymorphine safely. The female psyche and physiology is better able to undergo this training, and that is the reason why most members of the Callidus temple are female.

"There are, however, more than just a few male Callidus assassins…"

As he explained, St. Kristov's mind wandered. There was an unanswered question buzzing at the back of his mind.

The Eldar Craftworld was being drawn towards the energy signature of the Blackstone Fortress in the system. That meant that its Warp Core must be active. But if its Warp Core had been active before, it would surely have come to the Imperium's attention. And since it had remained undiscovered until now, it must have remained dormant for several millennia at least. The only conclusion that led to was that someone found it very recently and activated it. Most likely within the past few days, in fact. Just who was this someone?

* * *

The Adeptus Mechanicus doesn't exactly work the way the rest of the Imperium does. Techpriests don't exactly work the way an average Imperial citizen does either. But while most Techpriests are generally considered by others to be somewhere in between slightly unconventional to outright eccentric, here was an example of one so far detached from the blissful world of sanity that he'd long since kicked down such constraining barriers and ran off into the sunset, chortling with glee and waving a frying pan around in the air.

Archmagos Largo's entire stance spoke of one who was not only a cog, but also a handful of screws, several sprockets, an axle, a belt drive, all the other cogs and a whole bucket of engine grease short of a gear assembly. There was no mad gleam in his eye as his left eye had been replaced with a bionic one and he wore an eyepatch over the right eye, but his lopsided, crazy grin was eerily reminiscent of a bomb timer, the kind with the red, flashing digital readout and ticks away down to zero at a disconcertingly leisurely pace.

Fifty-two and a half hours ago, Largo's exploratory vessel, the Mechanicus battleship _Deus Ex Machina_, had emerged out of the Warp to find itself lightyears away from its intended destination due to a slight miscalculation on Largo's part.

Fifty-two hours and twenty-eight minutes ago, the Archmagos had noticed that there was a big black something floating around in space a short distance away from his ship.

Fifty-two hours and one minute ago, the _Deus Ex Machina_ had successfully docked with the Blackstone Fortress and Largo was preparing to lead a boarding party, consisting of himself and his cyborg bodyguard KESH, to 'get on there and have a bit of a lookaround'.

Fifty-one hours ago, Largo had fought his way through throngs of the Hrud (who had infested the Fortress over the many years of its abandonment) into the central control chamber of the ancient Eldar superweapon.

"_This is absolutely remarkable!" said Largo conversationally as he speared through two Hrud warriors and decapitated a third with an air of inattentive casualness. The remaining Hrud turned around and fled. Largo turned his gaze onto it and, at an unspoken command, a laser beam lanced out from his bionic eye, piercing the creature through the neck._

"_Look at the design of this corridor! It's amazing! These Eldar blokes sure have great architectural taste, eh KESH?" Largo rambled on. It did not seem to have occurred to the Archmagos that he was having an unequivocally one-sided conversation with a Praetorian servitor incapable of sentient thought, but then again, the fact would hardly have bothered him even if he had known it._

_A pair of Hrud warriors emerged out of an alcove in the corridor and blazed away desperately with their Warp-plasma rifles, but the energy bolts bounced harmlessly off Largo's personal force field. He actually bothered to spare the rat-like aliens each an irritated frown before roasting them alive with a stream of fire from the heavy flamer built into his servo-arm._

_He was at the end of the corridor now. A single Hrud, concealed in the shadowy recesses of the ceiling above, leapt downwards for a sneak attack against his seemingly unprotected back._

_Without even turning, the Techpriest calmly reversed his power trident, allowing his descending assailant to skewer itself on it like a piece of eggplant on a shish-kebab stick. It wasn't entirely fair on the Hrud – after all, nobody had told it that Largo's bionic eye gave him 360-degree vision._

"_Incredible!" exclaimed the Archmagos as he opened the door and stepped into the Blackstone Fortress's central control chamber, a spacious, yawning cavity at the heart of the structure where a pair of spiralling walkways coiled around the inactive Warp Core in a perfect double helix, up and down towards a ceiling and floor so far away they could not be seen._

_Largo stepped boldly up to the control panel nearest to him. There were instructions printed elegantly on it, in flowing, graceful script. But while Largo could speak passably good Eldar, he couldn't _read_ a word of it._

"_Ooh, shiny buttons," he giggled to himself. "This one looks fun."_

_The button glittered mysteriously as Largo's mechanical finger touched it. A soft humming started up in the depths of the massive Warp Core, and the faintest beginnings of a purple light pulsed as if awakening after a long sleep._

_Throughout the Fortress, the Hrud quavered restlessly._

* * *

Is this it? Is this the Ork Warboss?

It had to be. The psychic reflection of this greenskin was unusually strong, more so than any other aboard the Space Hulk. He must be terrifyingly large in the physical world. If this one wasn't the Orkish leader, Teldor didn't know who was.

Yes, this is quite definitely the Warboss, thought Teldor, allowing himself a small glow of pride at his own success. An Eldar Farseer never fails. I've found him, and now the rest is up to Silinde.

He lurks within a small personal space on the middle decks of the Hulk, somewhat separated from the crowds of his subordinates, behind a door with a sign which reads "AXiS'z MeKShoP".


	7. Chapter 6

(Disclaimer: The universe of Warhammer 40000 and all affiliated concepts are copyright of Games Workshop Ltd. They are used here without permission with no challenge intended to their legal owners. All characters are original creations of the author.)

* * *

_**Chapter 6**_

A small spacecraft silently sliced through the black void of space, moving with such grace and leaving the stillness so utterly undisturbed, you would hardly have believed it was moving even if you were watching it.

The act of watching it, at least with the naked eye, was unfortunately an impossibility. The reason for this was that the Eldar Phoenix fighter – for that was what the spacecraft was – had been equipped with a sophisticated holo-field which rendered it completely undetectable to all but the most sophisticated sensor systems.

The Phoenix carried only one passenger. There was no pilot, as there was not a single Eldar on Stel-Uit willing to let himself or herself be shut in a small space alone with Silinde. And so it was decided that the fighter was to be guided by spirit-stones, to the Orkish Space Hulk and back again. They had been instructed to seek out and dock at an inconspicuous location on the Hulk, away from the areas of higher greenskin concentration, and to wait there for one hour only. Should Silinde fail to return to the spacecraft within that time, it would fly back to the Craftworld on its own, leaving the Exarch stranded. Secretly, Farseer Teldor rather hoped that this exact situation would come to pass. Silinde was _dangerous_. Best for everyone if he just sort of went off, preferably without too much fanfare, and never came back.

Teldor was not alone – many other Eldar on Stel-Uit entertained similar thoughts as Silinde's Phoenix sped towards the _Abandon All Hope_.

And what of Silinde himself? The Striking Scorpions Exarch was not a psyker of any significant power and could not read minds, but was entirely aware of the opinions his people held towards him. He didn't much care. He had long since given up trying to point out the fact that he had never, not once in his life, come even halfway close to raising his chainsword against an Eldar.

In the heat of battle, his tendency to fly into berserker rages was a blessing, as his anger made him a considerably better fighter, but unfortunately it had also earned him the suspicion and distrust of his fellows. As a result, he now carried the label of "psychopathically dangerous". That label was a stigmatising, and above all, sticky one.

* * *

Snikmug's mind was slowly swimming back to consciousness. It was like swimming through a pool of jam. He tried opening his eyes but couldn't quite manage. They felt very gluey.

He could hear voices now. It sounded as though they were quite close by, but he couldn't make out the words. Evidently his ears weren't completely working either. That being said, he was fairly sure that the voices were arguing. There was nowhere you could go that had Orks but no arguing.

Where was he anyway? The last thing he remembered was being stabbed through the chest with a poisoned dagger by the humie in disguise as a Grot. Was he dead then? Had he finally joined Gork and Mork at the great eternal Waaagh! in the Warp?

A persistent, irritating buzzing noise started up from somewhere in the vicinity of his head. The _near_ vicinity of his head. It sounded like a chainsaw. Generally speaking, having an active chainsaw somewhere near your head is not a good thing. In most cases it is a fairly good indicator that your final, messy and painful moments are almost upon you.

Even as that thought hit him, some deeper, faster part of Snikmug's brain had already reacted and sent out an autonomic impulse urgently. A surge of adrenaline gushed through his body, imbuing him with a sudden burst of strength which cleared his gooey mind in a heartbeat. He threw his eyes wide open and saw the descending chainsaw. With lightning reflexes powered by sheer adrenergic energy, he performed a spectacular backwards somersault, getting out of the way not a moment too soon. The chainsaw struck the bare metal ground and sent up a shower of sparks.

He looked up into the dull metallic sheen of Dok Voldemork's face. (Of the many organs of his own body the Dok had replaced with a suitable cybernetic substitute, his skin was the most elaborate, and, not to mention, the most noticeable one.) The Dok's bionic eyes flickered questioningly.

"Holdz still willyer, Snikmug?" he droned. "'Ow'z I supposed ta operate on you'z when ya keepz movin' around? Now, diz won't 'urt a bit…" He raised his chainsaw again.

"NO!" screamed Snikmug, a little too loudly. In the near-silence that followed, disrupted only by the whirring chainsawy sounds of the Dok's surgical tool of choice, he noticed that there were faces peering out at him from behind Voldemork. One of them wore a welding mask. With a jolt, he realised that the faces were those of his ladz', and suddenly felt very awkward.

"Ya sure ya don't needz surjery?" tried Dok Voldemork again. "Yer looked well bad juz' now."

"I'z okay," Snikmug insisted.

"Hmph," grunted Voldemork. He revved his chainsaw one last time, just for effect, and trudged off.

The Kommandos gathered around their Nob anxiously.

"Mmrhmph mmph?" asked Gibko. Like most burna boyz, Gibko wore a welding mask all the time. The one he had, however, had been very poorly designed, even by Orky standards, and as a result, it muffled Gibko's speech to the point where he was almost utterly incomprehensible.

"'E'z arskin' ya 'ow yer feelz, Boss," translated Kaz, who had a gift for languages.

"I'z okay," said Snikmug again. It was true. Apart from a slight ache in his chest where he had been stabbed, he felt fresh as fungus beer and strong as a Squiggoth. The glueyness he'd felt only a minute before had disappeared without a trace, inexplicably. Snikmug vaguely wondered why. For a split second before losing consciousness, he had been sure the poison was going to kill him.

* * *

Orkish medicine is the sole domain of the Oddboyz caste most commonly referred to as 'Mad Dokz', but also occasionally as 'Painboyz', 'Bad Dokz', or 'Aaaaaaaahhh eek nonononono urrrrgh'. It is believed by some Imperial scholars that the Orks had been made in times long gone by an ancient creator race, who must have programmed medical knowledge directly into the Orky genome, such that Mad Dokz are innately able to cure wounded or diseased greenskins without the need for long, gruelling years of training.

Of course, every unproven theory raises questions – and eyebrows – and one of the questions raised by this theory is the following: If this so-called creator race was so advanced and knowledgeable, how come they didn't program the Orks to know about certain simple medical concepts like placebo effects or vaccination?

The question remains unanswered to this day. But just because you don't know about something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. And so it was that while neither Snikmug nor Dok Voldermork would probably have known what a vaccination was if it jabbed them in the arm, vaccination was precisely what happened to Snikmug.

_Snikmug was hungry. He'd just returned from an extended Genestealer-hunting trip deep into the un-Orkified areas of the space hulk and the excursion had left him positively famished. He sat at a corner table in his favourite restaurant, the Charadon Squig Grill, waiting impatiently for his order to arrive._

_He'd come at a busy time and the restaurant was packed full of Orks, all talking loudly, banging their cutlery on the tables and yelling at the food to come fasta. There was hardly a free seat left. In fact, as far as Snikmug could see, the only unoccupied space left was the one opposite him, at the same table._

_And then, twitching randomly and mumbling incoherently, Ringa Ringa staggered into the restaurant and plonked himself down into that very seat. He offered Snikmug a wide, toothy grin._

_Snikmug squirmed. No Ork apart from the most deranged of Madboyz could possibly feel safe in the presence of a Weirdboy. He wondered if he should leave while he could, before something bad happened. Something bad was bound to happen. He was in a restaurant filled with noisy Orks, and there was a Weirdboy right opposite him, soaking up all the Waaagh! If he suddenly started breathing fire or shooting lightning from his eyes… But then again, his order could be coming any minute now. If he left, he'd miss his food…_

_He didn't much like the idea of going somewhere else and having to wait for food all over again. He was hungry enough as it was. He'd stay, he decided. He'd take a chance and hope that nothing would happen before he finished eating…_

_Of course, as is so often the case in situations such as these, Sod's Law dictated that something had to go wrong at precisely the worst moment. The thought had barely left his conscious mind when there came a crash from the next table. That could only mean one thing. Sooner than you could say "'ere we go", said table had been knocked over and a fight had broken out. Orks being Orks, it took little time for almost every other greenskin in the restaurant to join in._

"_Oh no…" Snikmug's eyes widened in horror. Close by him, Ringa Ringa had gone into a fit of violent convulsions, his eyes glowing green and flares of psychic energy sparking off his skin. Snikmug leapt to his feet, his hunger forgotten in his frantic need to escape, but it was too late._

_An Ork with a choppa lodged in his chest stumbled backwards into Snikmug, knocking him back into his seat. He did not even have time to swear before Ringa Ringa vomited a small deluge of venomous snakes all over him._

_Time stopped. Snikmug saw his life flash by before his eyes._

_And then, one by one, the serpents sank their fangs deep into his skin. He fainted._

As it turned out, Snikmug survived the incident and would later 'accidentally' smash up Ringa Ringa's interesting collection of skulls in revenge. Had he known exactly what changes the snakes had made to his physiology, however, he might have felt less resentful.

In the process of being bitten so many times by so many different kinds of snake, Snikmug had developed a permanent immunity to most types of poison known to Ork and man.

* * *

The Kommandos gradually dispersed, and Snikmug was left alone in the corridor, drinking thoughtfully out of the flask of grog they had given him. Somehow, once again, he was alive. He swore to himself that the next time he saw that humie he'd knock it over the head and feed it to the squigs… next time…

Come to think of it, the humie must still be on the Hulk, right? They were in space – there was no way off the _Abandon All Hope_ except maybe by fighta-bomma, and someone would certainly notice if one of those went missing. Besides, the humie looked like it was here to spy on them, what with the Grot disguise and everything, so it probably wasn't in a hurry to go anywhere anytime soon.

That being said, a Hulk was still an enormously large place, and there were literally billions of Gretchin in Waaagh! Badklaw. Someone wanting to find a single, specific Grot in this place would have a hard time figuring out where to even begin looking…

As he meandered languidly down the corridor, he considered for a short while whether to alert Badklaw to the presence of the humie or not. If the Warboss knew he'd be able to order every Boy in the Waaagh! to keep an eye out for it… but no. Badklaw probably wouldn't believe him to begin with, and besides, he wanted to get that humie _personally_.

He passed by "AXiS'z MeKShoP".

Then he doubled back.

Something was wrong. There were no flashes of blue-green light, no random explosions emitting from the half-open doorway of the Mekshop. There was no smoke, no sparks, no gunfire. Only a disturbing silence, and darkness.

It was never silent or dark in Axis' Mekshop. Even when the Big Mek himself was out buying or salvaging tools and supplies, his Grot assistants kept the place running – that is to say, kept the place on fire, ridden with bullet holes or otherwise in need of repair every half hour or so.

The whole situation smelled of trouble to Snikmug. Had Axis been attacked by the disguised humie? Or had the Big Mek finally killed himself with one of his own inventions? Despite his apprehension, Snikmug decided to go and investigate.

Carefully, he poked his head around the gap of the doorway. All was still. He warily pushed the door further open, allowing light from the corridor to stream in and illuminate the darkened room.

Most of the shadows stubbornly held their ground, but enough of them retreated that Snikmug could make out the shapes of various objects in the central area of the Mekshop.

His eyes widened in shock.

There, on the floor, half-hidden by a workbench, was a corpse. An Ork corpse.

Headless.


End file.
